SoCal/NoCal/Crater Lake/Sonora Pass Aug. 2011

Took a nice tour from Orange County California up to Crater Lake, Oregon. This was a bit of a last minute setup although the destination had been in my mind for a few months. Lefty (John) and DefyInertia (Nate) were able to take time to join me for sections of this adventure. This seems to be a popular place to visit as Vegasrider, etc are doing the same this summer. Let me give a daily summary of how things went along with some photos, videos will be linked in a few days....

Day 1- Early start to day, although typical morning rush hour traffic in to and out of the Los Angeles area. North on the very scenic Interstate 5 to Coalinga, then over to Hwy 25. This is a great 75 mile run through horse farms and agriculture with little traffic and lots of twists and elevation changes. Out of Gilroy, across the Silicon Valley and over to the famous Hwy 35/Skyline Dr. Up along there to Alice's Restaurant where I met with Lefty. He and his wife were gracious enough to allow me to stay overnight at their home. He then joined me for the next 4 days for the big push up through NoCal to southern Oregon and back. The first of several 400+ mile days...

The ride awaits...





I had a constant traveling companion thanks to my daughter.





The south end of CA 25





Lefty at home..he has no idea what is going to happen next.

Day 2- Lefty and I left his home in the South Bay area to head to San Francisco to meet with DefyInertia who would ride with us for most of the day. A typical SF morning with heavy cloud cover/fog around the bay but bright/clear skies once we gained a little distance and elevation. Still, just beautiful weather....

Anyway, north on the 101 for a while until we arrived at Cloverdale for the ride out on CA128 to the coast. This is one of the most pleasant stretches of roadway that I know of and I make a point of traveling the 55 mile length each time I am in the area. Nothing to technical or fast, just gorgeous terrain and wonderful aromas from the foliage. The payoff is the final 12 mile section through the Navarro River Redwoods State Park. If you haven't been there Google it. If you have ridden through you know what I mean, words don't describe the visual and olfactory sensations that you get. I have HD on-board video of this area but will need to process it for online viewing.

After exiting the Navarro River area we continued north on Hwy 1 through to Ft. Bragg for lunch. Returning on our way we turned inland at Branscomb Rd. for a ride towards Laytonville. Another typical narrow logging road that is common in this part of the country, it made for a nice change in our speed and concentration levels. You can't let your mind drift at all in areas like this as corners aren't always marked, the road can be as narrow as 10-12 ft wide and logging trucks lurk around any turn.

Once we made it to the 101 we continued towards the metropolis of Garberville where DefyInertia headed east towards his own destination to camp with his family. Lefty and I took the stunning Ave. of the Giants to our turnout to head toward the Lost Coast Hwy. This is a remote portion of California that includes the longest undeveloped stretch of coastline in the United States. Well worth the diversion off the main drag. After leaving this area we finished up the day in Eureka.

Another >400 mile day.

Lunchtime in Ft. Bragg







Nate taking a break along Branscomb Rd.










Another look down from Branscomb Rd.










3 samples of the great view from the grade above the Lost Coast Hwy.

Day 3- Ok, after a nice breakfast and discussion of how to solve all of the worlds problems, Lefty and I started towards Willow Creek CA. This little gateway in the Trinity National Forest is the beginning of a piece of must-ride road, CA96. This is a 150 mile long trek through nothing but National Forest lands and Tribal reservations. The pace varies from fast sweepers and long clear stretches to VERY tight cliff running to 25 mph towns that are 1/4 mile from end to end. Just be sure to fill up as fuel is not always available along this path on a consistent basis.

Once we emerged from this area it was a short burst north to Ashland to eat before heading east on Oregon 66 to Klamath Falls. It was about 4:00 when we got to our hotel and we simply dumped off our luggage and blasted out to Crater Lake, the Goal of all this effort. As it was about 160 mile round trip we got moving, finding some of the most desolate roadway of the trip along the west side of Upper Klamath Lake to test the limits of our FZs. It was a rush through the sweepers....

Anyway we arrived at the Crater Lake National Park gate and headed up to the rim. Got the pictures and video we wanted and then continued along the 33 mile long Rim Drive. Headed on back to Klamath falls for a late dinner and some rest.

450+ miles today, we weren't screwing around!


All images are from the rim of Crater Lake. We didn't get much time for anything else this day...

Day 4- Another relaxed start to the day (us old guys need to get our sleep!) saw us heading south towards Lake Tahoe. This day would probably best be classified as "Patience Required". Its a rather monotonous run on Hwy 139 from Klamath Falls to Susanville. A few twisty sections woke us up but we spend most of our time either riding in a straight line at highway speed or sitting at a flagman post waiting for road maintenance crews. Seriously, from this day on we counted 11 separate work zones that required us to stop and wait for road repairs to be carried out. A couple were only 2-5 minutes but we spend one time waiting maybe 20 minutes at the flagman only to then follow the pilot truck for 6-7 miles. WTF??

So, on towards Susanville for lunch, then travel to Quincy, Truckee and then the West shore of Lake Tahoe. However, it IS summer so the tourists in their oblivious state of mind were busy holding up traffic for miles on end. It really ruined the Tahoe rim ride for Lefty and I but so be it. Headed in to town, got a room and proceeded to find a wonderful restaurant on a pier over the lake. Great dinner, conversation and plenty of adult beverages, so all was not lost..

This was a short day, only 350 miles but it felt much longer with all of the delays. No pictures from this day from me, maybe Left will have something to add.

Day 5- This was Lefty's last day so we got in a lot of great roads. South out of Tahoe we headed on the southern end of CA89 over Monitor Pass to the 395, a little highway riding down to CA120, then south for a ride over the famous Sonora Pass. Great road, its amazing how well its maintained considering it is closed for at least 6 months each year due to heavy snowfall. Down the hill to Sonora for lunch, then we continued on towards Jamestown where Lefty continued west home and I headed north to Rocklin to visit my daughter and her husband.

About 250 miles for me, and I had a nasty cold giving me grief.

Pictures from the summit...

Day 6- Nothing exciting here as I just wanted to get home with my head spinning from being sick. A miserable 430 miles...and then it was over.

A couple of things...I really had a great time traveling with John (Lefty) as he knows how to enjoy the flow of the scenery as well as keeping the miles moving under the bike. You just never know how these things will turn out until the journey is well under way, which is then too late to turn back if personalities clash. Thanks John, it was a trip for the memory banks. And thanks to Nate for carving a bit of time out of the busy family life to get in some mileage. He gave me a couple of trip planning suggestions that made things more interesting, he is a invaluable resource of riding routes in Northern California. Can't wait to get back up there to ride with you guys again!!

As I mentioned earlier, there are some awesome HD videos I captured of several of these roads. However, I am waiting for my "Media Consultant" to return from vacation to assist in converting the odd Sony format to something that is web-friendly.

Final note: I put on a set of Bridgestone BT023 for this trip. 2300 miles and just stellar performance and wear. Both tires are still round in profile, probably going to last 8000+ miles. We never saw any rain so I can't comment on wet traction but they performed as well as possible in the dry, as in no chicken strips left on a fully loaded bike.

Thanks John for inviting me along for one of the best trips of my life. :thumbup: I'll add a few observations and pics although Cali rider has hit most of the important stuff already.

Friday afternoon I met John up on Skyline at Alice's after only a 5 minute wait which was pretty remarkable since he had called me when he was 100 miles out. After leading him back to my house, about 10 miles away, we set out with my wife to our favorite Hof Brau to enjoy a nice meal and great selection of beers. John and my wife Carrie seemed to hit it off like old friends and I was beginning to feel like the third wheel.

After a good night's sleep, were ready to set off to meet DefyInertia in S.F. by 8:00. Some of us were more bright eyed and bushy tailed than others....

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Great pictures John!

I want to get a ride in up there. I'm already scoping out how I'll get rigged up with camping gear on the SV.

Thank you for sharing and it's great to see my other riding friends enjoying the ride with you! :rockon:

We met DefyInertia (Nate) at the appointed time, although John and I were 20 minutes early..and road north to Nate's favorite pizza parlour in Ft. Bragg.
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After lunch, Nate to the lead again and took us up to Branscomb Rd. road which was narrow, twisty, and fun! Unfortunately while riding behind Nate he began to hit himself on the side of his helmet quite forcefully and then promptly pulled to the side of the road where he go his gloves and helmet off in record time to free the bee that had flown in his helmet. We decided it might be a good time to take a break and let some of our pulses lower just a bit.
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We parted ways with Nate later in the day and John and I explored the Giant Redwoods, the Lost Highway and ended up on the Lost Coast before calling it a day in Eureka. The Lost Highway remains lost to this day for the simple reason it's a bone jarring, tooth shaking, part asphalt (?) gravel, rock and dirt road. But the Lost Coast was eerily awesome.
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Day 2
Took us up Highway 96 which is almost indescribably awesome.:BLAA:
140 miles of perfect pavement, consistent curves (mostly), a view of the Klamath River below, and about a dozen cars in 140 miles! John and I discussed the fact that it was sooo good it was almost mesmerizing and would start to lull you into an almost hypnotic state of mind. Unfortunately it was so awesome that we never stopped to take a break or take pics. Sorry...

Our ride up to Crate Lake at the end of the day was spectacular and as we were trying to get there and back before the sun went down we were fortunate that the roads up there were unpatrolled. Words can't describe how breathtaking the scenery was so here's just a couple of pictures.

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Day 3

After another well deserved night's sleep in Klamath Falls, we headed down towards Lake Tahoe. As John has said, not much in the way of twisty roads, but the scenery was good enough to almost make up for the straight roads. As John has mentioned too, we now figured out why SoCal has no money for roads improvements....all the money is being spent in NorCal fixing up our motorcycling roads. :Flip: Of the 11 roadblocks and flagman delays we encountered in two days this one was the best. She has to be the cutest flagperson I have every seen..

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We did manage to finagle our way to the front of the line at almost every road stop so at least when we finally got by the pilot car we had an open road in front of us, until the next stoppage of course.

And though the day was relatively relaxed road wise it wasn't without incidents.. Day 3 tally for Cali rider: Missed being hit by a van that ran a red light due to John's superior riding skills experience; 1 confirmed ground squirrel fatality, 12 near misses; 1 bat/small bird to his shoulder; 1 large piece of bark on top of his gas tank from a logging truck; and narrowly missing a brick from a trailer flying at him at a rocket like speed. Good riding John. :thumbup:

Traffic from Truckee to So. Lake Tahoe was frustratingly horrendous, but we eventually got over it and just enjoyed the view at 15 mph. We blew the bank on our last night and stayed at a beautiful lodge on the lake that had it's own restaurant on Lake Tahoe where we enjoyed a sunset dinner and John educated me on the finer points of drinking Scotch. What an end to our last night on the road.

Day 4

Unfortunately my last day riding with John started out with John not feeling any better after a restless night's sleep. We were however within walking distance of his favorite breakfast place in Tahoe. Per his recommendation we both had pancakes with raspberry compote that lived up to the hype and drank alot of coffee.

Leaving Tahoe our string of delays due to roadwork was not to be unbroken since we hit at least four more getting over Monitor Pass down Highway 395 and finally to Highway 108 and the Sonora Pass.

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Both our bikes and ourselves seemed to dislike the elevation at the summit and as John still wasn't feeling anywhere near 100% we took it rather easy on Highway 108 coming into the Sonora area where we grabbed a quick bite and re-hydrated since the temperature had climbed to around 100º.
After lunch we said our farewells and John headed up to Rocklin for the night and I headed home to the Bay Area with fond memories of the ride and wishing I could ride for a few more days with Cali rider.

As John said in his previous posts, spending days with someone you haven't know for a long time can end up being awkward and uncomfortable if you find you have nothing in common to talk about except bikes or your personalities aren't compatible, that was certainly not the case with us. Thanks John for including me on your ride and making it a ride I'll never forget, for many reasons.
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That looks like an epic adventure :rockon: thanks for sharing, now let's set up another group ride in norcal :BLAA:

Lefty said:

Day 4

Unfortunately my last day riding with John started out with John not feeling any better after a restless night's sleep. We were however within walking distance of his favorite breakfast place in Tahoe. Per his recommendation we both had pancakes with raspberry compote that lived up to the hype and drank alot of coffee.

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Lefty---I say it was this place:

Heidi's Family Restaurants - Our Locations ?

If it was, this is same place where Wavex (with Calirider) treated me to a breakfast (beginner's luck at "Let it Ride" or something casino table game previous night!) about a year ago.

Go Tahoe---I love the place!

Tailgate said:

Lefty---I say it was this place:

Heidi's Family Restaurants - Our Locations ?

If it was, this is same place where Wavex (with Calirider) treated me to a breakfast (beginner's luck at "Let it Ride" or something casino table game previous night!) about a year ago.

Go Tahoe---I love the place!

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Stacy, you nailed it on the head! Of all the things Cali rider and I did, only this and Crater Lake were on our "must do" list.

Excellent write up you guys - glad everyone had a good time and made it through safely.

Crater Lake is awesome, I can't wait to get back up there some time. I have always wanted to see the Lost Coast, now I am really jonesin'!

Great pics and descriptions - thank you! :thumbup:

Thank you for the great report with awesome pics. This has made me think about some alterations to the final leg of my upcoming trip.

Awesome pics and ride report. Thanks for sharing! :thumbup:

Great ride report! :thumbup: Some damn good pictures...looking forward to the video. Seems like you guys had a pretty good ride...and even got decent weather up at Crater Lake (I know what you mean about "making time" on the roads in that area...some seriously straight/wide stuff out there).

I definitely had fun riding with you guys...I'm glad it worked out. I remeber thinking to myself while we were on HWY 101 between branscomb road and Garberville: "NorCal....even our freeways are twisty" :BLAA:

That reminds me, John, I'm going to make a point of exploring old HWY 101 up that way and taking some pictures. You might enjoy this write up from a local DRZ rider that did just that: Old highway 101 near Redway

Cali rider said:

Once we made it to the 101 we continued towards the metropolis of Garberville where DefyInertia headed east towards his own destination to camp with his family.

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Oh yeah, took me about 10 minutes of driving around Garberville after you guys took off before I found the road I was looking for that would take me up over the mountains to HWY 36. Without the GPS I also missed a couple hidden turns...finding myself on gravel roads and having to double-back. My not-very-detailed-map had just enough detail so I managed to find the intended 60 mile path to the one and only 36....passed about 6 cars on my 90 mile blast to Red Bluff.

Got to Red Bluff around 6ish and had to spend about 15 minutes at the gas station soaking my head in bathroom, enjoying the A/C, and driniking fluids (I had run out of water about 30 miles back and it was near 100F). I had told my wife I'd be at the lake AROUND 6:30 pm....got there at 6:50 pm (could have pulled it off if I had not gotten lost).


See that giant rock out there just off the shore in the distance, that piece of the coast is the farthest point west in all of California. Kinda cool.

Thanks for the pics and ride report guys! I almost felt like I was there...